Decorative wreath



July 14, 1970 F. M. AGENA ET AL 3,520,759

DECORATIVE WREATH Filed March 80 1.967 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 11 4 jg,flvvs/vraa. 1! J0 A jZwA/c/s MA6E/W4; SH/QLEy M- AIS-5 July 14, 1970AGENA ET AL 3,520,759

DECORAT IVE WREATH Filed March 8, 1967 2 Sheets-$heet 2 JvvEA/m/Qsi fiAAAC/S M. AG 5/4/2455/ M. A 65x44,

United States Patent 3,520,759 DECORATIVE WREATH Francis M. Agena andShirley M. Agena, both of 1931 W. 20th St., Los Angeles, Calif. 90018Filed Mar. 8, 1967, Ser. No. 621,528 Int. Cl. A47g 33/08; B32b 3/06 U.S.Cl. 161--15 7 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE The main objects of thisinvention are to provide an ornamental wreath structure easilyfabricable from inexpensive, readily available material, the structurecomprising a support plate to which is secured a circular array offlexible cards having outwardly facing conically formed ends, the cardsbeing built up in layers with the conical points of each successivelayer being more steeply inclined with respect to the surface of thesupport plate so that the wreath will have a quadrantal cross-sectionalconfiguration.

The novel features which are believed to be characteristic of thepresent invention, together with further objects and advantages thereof,will be better understood from the following description in which theinvention is illustrated by way of example. It is to be expresslyunderstood, however, that the description is for the purpose ofillustration only and that the true spirit and scope of the invention isdefined by the accompanying claims.

In the drawing:

FIGS. la, 1b and 1c are perspective views of a flexible card,illustrating the formation of a conical end portion;

FIG. 2 is a partial perspective view showing how the card of FIG. 1 issecured to a support plate;

FIG. 3 is a plan view, partially cut away, of a completed wreath;

FIG. 4 is an enlarged view taken along the line 44 of FIG. 3;

FIG. 5 is an end view of a mounted card, as in FIG. 2;

FIGS. 6a and 6b are perspective views illustrating the formation of analternative card embodiment;

FIGS. 7a and 7b are perspective views illustrating formation of anothercard embodiment; and

FIG. 8 is a plan view of the completed card shown in FIG. 7d.

Referring now to the drawings, and more particularly to FIGS. 1alc,there is shown one technique for forming the flexible cards whichcomprise the wreath. FIG. 1a shows one of the elongate flexiblerectangular cards, generally indicated by the reference numeral 10, thecard being of any suitable material such as thin cardboard or plastic.The cards 10 may be of any convenient size, with punch-coded IBM cardsbeing presently preferred for wreaths on the order of 18 inches indiameter. In the illustrated embodiment of FIG. 1, the two end portionsof the card are indicated by the reference numerals 11 and 12. The card10 is formed by bending the corners of the end portion 11 in an arcuatefashion toward each other, as indicated in FIG. lb, and bringing the endportions together until they overlap. The corners are secured inoverlapping relationship by any convenient means such as by stapling asshown in FIG. 10, or by gluing. In this fashion a plurality of the cards10 are formed, the thus formed cards providing the points of the wreath.By tightly overlapping the card corners at the pointed end 11 3,520,759Patented July 14, 1970 the conical end will terminate in almost aperfect point, whereas if the corners are secured in only slightlyoverlapping relationship a somewhat truncated point will be formed, theaperture at this truncated point being sometimes preferable to create adifferent ornamental effect.

A plurality of cards 10 are formed in the abovedescribed manner formounting to a circular support plate 15, shown in FIGS. 2, 3 and 4. Thesupport plate 15 may be fabricated of corrugated cardboard, or othersuitable material. Construction of the wreath is begun by placing one ofthe conically pointed cards on the upper surface of the support plate15, the card being inverted so that the overlapped corner portions ofits pointed end 11 are facing downwardly toward the support plate 15, asindicated in FIG. 2. The flat end 12 of the card 10 is secured to theupper surface of the support plate 15, with the card oriented in radialalignment with its conically formed end facing outwardly and overhangingthe edge of the support plate, as indicated in FIG. 2. It is presentlypreferred to glue the cards to the support plate, although othersuitable fastening techniques, such as stapling for example, will beapparent to those skilled in the art.

Then, another card 10 is inverted and placed on the support plateadjacent the previously mounted card and secured thereto in radialalignment and partially overlapping the flat portion of the first card,as indicated in the cut away portion of FIG. 3. More cards aresuccessively added in radial alignment to form a singlelayer circulararray on the support plate, all of the cards being inverted and mountedwith their conically formed ends facing outwardly in the manner shown inFIG. 2.

Next, a second layer of cards is mounted, the cards in the second layerbeing indicated in FIGS. 3 and 4 by the reference numeral 10a. The cards1011 are also in radial alignment, but displaced from the underlyinglayer of cards 10 so that the pointed ends of the cards 1011 will beapproximately midway between the pointed ends of the underlying cards10. Also, the cards 10a are positioned slightly more towards the centerof the support plate so that the pointed end portions of the underlyingcards 10 will support the pointed end portions of the cards 10a andforce the conical points of the cards 10a into a steeper angularalignment, as indicated in FIG. 4.

Then a subsequent radially aligned layer of cards, indicated by thereference numeral 10b is added, followed by succeeding layers of cards10c, 10d, etc. As each succeeding layer of cards is added, the pointedend portions of the underlying layers force the pointed end portions ofthe succeeding layers into a steeper inclination with respect to thesupport plate, thereby forming a wreath having a substantiallyquadrantal cross sectional configuration. Sufficient additional layersof cards can be added until the pointed end portions of the cards in thelast layer are substantially perpendicular to the underlying supportplate, only a relatively small diameter open space remaining in thecenter of the wreath structure.

A smaller flat end portion of the cards in each of the successivelyadded layers are secured to the underlying cards and support plate, agreater portion of the cards projecting outwardly and upwardly to formthe quadrantal cross section. Upon completion of the wreath structurethe wreath may be sprayed with paint of any desired color, and any otherdesired ornamentation added. As an example of further ornamentation,there is indicated in FIG. 3 a string of miniature electric light bulbs18 and ornamental balls 19. Also, additional ornamentation may bemounted in the center hole of the wreath.

FIG. 6 of the drawing shows how the cards formed in the manner of FIGS.1 and 2 can be adapted so that their conically pointed ends naturallyassume an angular inclination with respect to the remainder of the card.A card has a conically pointed end portion 21 formed in the hereinabovedescribed manner and a flat end portion 22. A transverse slit 23 is outnear the base of the pointed end portion 21 and the card islongitudinally creased down its center from its end 22 to the transverseslit 23 to form a central fold line 24a. The card is also creased in astraight line extending from the slit 23 to one corner of the flat end22 to form a diagonal fold line 24b, as indicated in FIG. 6a. Note thatin this embodiment the card is not inverted, i.e., the overlapped endcorners are facing upwards. The card is then folded along its fold linesto form a folded over portion 24, which stresses the card to snap thepointed end portion 21 into angular alignment with the folded overportion 24. A plurality of these so-formed cards are secured to thesupport plate to form the multilayer circular arrays giving theornamental wreath configuration.

FIGS. 7 and 8 of the drawing show yet another technique for forming aconically pointed card wherein the conical point is naturally angularlyinclined with respect to the flat portion of the card. A rectangularcard shown in FIG. 7a has opposing ends 31 and 32. A longitudinallyextending central slit 34 extends from the end 32, thereby dividing theend 32 into two parallel end portions indicated as 32a and 32b in FIG.7b. Extending angularly rearwardly from the center of the opposing edgesof the card are slits 36 and 37. Next, the card corners at the end 31are bent arcuately toward each other and secured in overlappingrelationship to form a conically pointed end in the manner indicated inFIGS. la-lc the card then appearing as shown in FIG. 7c.

Then, the end portion 32a is raised upwardly and passed over the endportion 32b and then lowered so that the slit 36 engages with the slit37, the end portions 32a and 32b then being pushed toward each other tointerlock them so that the card will appear as shown in FIG. 7d, thepointed end portion 31 then naturally assuming an angular inclination.The angle of inclination of the pointed end portion is determined by thedistance of the slots 36 and 37 from the end 32 of the card, the closerthese slits to the end the lower the angle of inclination. For example,there are shown in phantom lines on FIG- 70 a pair of edge slits 36' and37'. In the plan view of FIG. 8 the solid line portion indicates a trueplan view of the card 30 when slitted at 36 and 37, while the phantomlines indicate the plan view of the card if slitted at 36 and 37', thedifference in the angle of inclination of the pointed end portion beingreadily discernible.

In using the slitted embodiment shown in FIGS. 7 and 8 the first formed(underlying) layers of the wreath would utilize cards slitted at 36' and37, the cards of the very top layers being slit even closer to the end32 of the cards.

Alternatively, a wreath could be constructed by using cards 10 for thefirst few layers, with succeeding layers using cards 30. Othertechniques for modifying the basically formed cards 10 will be apparentto those skilled in the art. Hence, although the invention has beendescribed with a certain degree of particularly, it is understood thatthe present disclosure has been made only by way of example and thatnumerous changes in the details of construction and the combination andarrangement of parts may be resorted to without departing from the 4spirit and the scope of the invention as hereinafter claimed.

What is claimed is:

1. An ornamental wreath comprising a support plate and a plurality ofelongate cards of flexible sheet material, the corner portions at oneend of each card being bent inwardly and secured in overlappingrelationship to form a conical end, the cards being secured together attheir other ends in a multi-layered circular array on said supportplates with their conically formed ends facing outwardly, wherein theconically formed ends of the cards of each successive layer of saidcircular array are supported by those of the underlying layers in asteeper inclination with respect to said support plate to thereby form awreath having a substantially quadrantal crosssectional configuration.

2. An ornamental wreath as defined in claim 1, wherein said cards arerectangular in shape.

3. An ornamental wreath as defined in claim 1, wherein said cards arealigned with their overlapped corners facing toward said support plate.

-4. An ornamental wreath as defined in claim 1, wherein at least some ofthe cards are aligned with their overlapped corners facing away fromsaid support plate and having a central transverse slit at the base oftheir conically formed ends, each of these cards also having a firststraight fold line down its center from said other end to saidtransverse slit and a second straight fold line extending from saidtransverse slit to one corner of said other end, these cards beingfolded on said fold lines so that the triangular card segment betweensaid first and second fold lines overlies the card segment extendingbetween said second fold line and the adjacent longitudinal card edgeand underlies the card segment extending between said first fold lineand the other longitudinal card edge, whereby the conically pointed cardend is snapped into angular alignment with the remainder of the card.

5. An ornamental wreath as defined in claim 1, wherein said other end ofat least some of the cards is longitudinally slit and the opposing sideedges angularly inwardly slit, the conically pointed end of each slittedcard being bent angularly upwards from said support plate and somaintained by interlocking of the opposing edge slits.

6. An ornamental wreath as defined in claim 5, wherein said longitudinalslit is equidistant from the card side edges, and said angular edgeslits are equidistant from the card end.

7. An ornamental wreath as defined in claim 1, wherein the inwardly bentcorner portions of said cards are secured in such a degree ofoverlapping relationship that the conical end is truncated.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 12/1955 MacGregor 16ll5 7/1962Paar 16l-9 US. Cl. X.R. 16l48

